The Playboy Prince's Baby - Ana Sparks Page 0,27

called out. “Come in!”

The man who entered was my brother’s main assistant, and I lifted one eyebrow at him, already knowing that this was going to be trouble.

“Carlos,” I said smoothly. “I don’t often see you on this side of the estate. What can I do for you?”

Carlos sketched out a bow to me—a requirement, courtesy of my position in the family—and then let his mouth twitch in the start of a grin.

A grin that I returned.

I’d known Carlos for most of my life, as he’d grown up as the son of my father’s own assistant. We had seen each other through boyhood and into the gangly teenage years, when we were both trying to figure out who the hell we were. And we’d stayed friends into adulthood—even when he became my brother’s man, and his loyalties had to shift.

And he and I both knew that if he was here, knocking at my door, it meant I was either already in trouble or about to be.

“Your brother has requested a lunch date,” he said simply, surprising me.

“That’s it?” I asked. “Lunch with Javier? Or is there a catch hidden in there that you haven’t told me about yet?”

Another twitch of the lips. I didn’t know why he didn’t just go ahead and smile. We were in my private rooms, after all, and he knew I wouldn’t turn him in for breaking protocol.

“I wouldn’t call it a catch,” he said. “But the king does want to discuss your… future.”

He lifted an eyebrow at that last word, and everything fell abruptly into place. Javier, my older brother and king of the nation, the man who was married and already working on producing an heir, had decided that it was time for me to do the same.

Or at least, a younger brother’s version of the same.

“So he thinks I need to settle down, get a wife, and start making babies?” I guessed.

Carlos finally broke out into the smile he’d been flirting with and cocked his head. “I wouldn’t know, Your Highness. He did not give me the details of his thoughts ahead of time. I assume he’ll be quite forthcoming with them when you ask, though. At lunch this afternoon.”

“Ah,” I said, further understanding. So lunch was already planned, then, and we probably had reservations already set. My agreement was really just a technicality.

But that was what I got for being the spare.

“Well then, I suppose I’ll have to accept. If only to find out what exactly he’s thinking,” I told Carlos, softening the statement with a smile.

Because it wasn’t his fault my brother wanted to control my life and tell me how to move forward. It wasn’t Carlos’s fault that I had spent my entire life avoiding this exact conversation—and was now going to, I suspected, finally have to pay the bills for all the things I’d done during that rebellious era.

When I walked into the restaurant—one of the best in Orlo—I saw that Javier’s security had done a pretty complete job of cleaning the place out before our lunch date. There were still a few couples around the edge of the room, but they would have been searched for weapons, and would be dining with our security guards breathing down their necks.

Our country was small and mostly peaceful, and we’d never had any problems. But there was no point in risking the king’s safety just so he could have lunch with his brother.

“Javier,” I said, sliding into the seat across from him and looking him up and down. “You look like you haven’t slept in a week.”

He gave me a grim smile. “Longer than that, actually. If it looks like it’s only been a week, I suppose that means the youth elixir is working.”

I took a sip of my own elixir—a gin and tonic, which was already sitting on the table, courtesy of Javier—and gave him a much more carefree smile. “What, you’ve gone off the whole blood-of-virgins diet and onto an elixir instead?”

He waved that suggestion off. “Well, one can only drink so much blood before it makes you sick.”

I toasted him with my drink. “You’ve never made me feel better about being the second son.”

And that right there was the truth. Being the spare was hard on the old ego, but it meant I didn’t have to rule the kingdom by myself, or as the face of the government, and I thanked the universe for that on the daily. Because I’d seen how much it took out of my